Ending Income Inequality & Climate Change

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According to recent research by Experts:

. . . assortative mating has a role to play in household income inequality. Empirically, it has been found that the proportion of couples who share the same level of schooling has been growing over the past few decades. This has been accompanied by a rise in household income inequality.

Assortative mating is when people of similar economic and/or educational background marry each other and the rate at which this is occurring in our society is increasing.  In conjunction with the rise of children living in single-parent households over the past 40 years it is the major contributor to inequality.

At the same time other Experts have determine that divorce is a major contributor to the warming of the planet and the destruction of the Earth's resources.  According to a study reported by the Washington Post individuals post-divorce use between 42% and 61% more water and electricity than when they lived together and according to the UN State of the World Population Report (2009) "a divorce may cause more carbon dioxide emissions than an additional birth".

In addition we know that health outcomes are better for married couples as well as for children not raised in single family homes and controlling our country's rocketing health costs is extremely important, particularly now that the government is paying for more of such care.

Given this data the solution seems obvious.  The President needs to propose and Congress should enact a law declaring that urgent need to reduce income inequality and end the risk of dangerous global warming requires national action.  In order to meet these needs the President and the relevant executive branch actions would be authorized to take certain actions:

• At 18 every citizen will be assigned a mate for purposes of marriage.  The process used will be developed by the same folks responsible for developing the algorithm under the President's recent Electoral Reform Proposal.  The algorithm will be designed to maximize marriages across economic and educational levels taking into account race, ethnicity, sex and gender.

• Divorce laws be will nationalized and grounds for divorce will be strictly limited in order to minimize its environmental impact.

• In those limited circumstances where divorce is permitted, the divorced parties will be given three choices:

           (i)   Assignment to live in a group home until such time as they are married again
          (ii)  Accept a new marriage partner as assigned to them by the algorithm
         (iii) Individuals may remain single and not live in a group home if they purchase the proper       regulatory determined amount of certified Carbon Offset Credits.

Now that we've solved that what's next?